Morning journal and courier., 1887-02-15
The Prose ofCow Punching.

From the Tomah Enterprise
 Time was, and not so very long ago either, when the cowboys received their pay after the round up they felt in duty bound to go to Miles City aud blow it in at the gambling deus saloons and other disreputable places. Cow punching is at best a very tough busl- ness and full of risks to life and limb, and pay is small and by no means adequate, and after the roundup there follows 8 long peri cd of enforced idleness, during which they are given food and lodging only by the ranch owner The average cowboy was wont to turn up after his semi-annual spree With very large head and not cent in his pocket Of late, however, the boys have taken a tumble to themselves and saving their money. So common has the economical spirit become among them that Miles City has seen this year it's quietest season.
 Most of the cowboys looked upon their coming to Montana to herd cattle as the mis- take of their lives. The growing stories of thrilling adventure and sudden wealth ot the cowboys life, which are common in the East are in most cases responsible for thelr entering the guild, but the reality IS quite different matter. Many of the economical ones have been enabled by their savings 10 return to their eastern homes.
 PeopIe who have not been through the bad lands have but faint conception of the ut ter desolation and worthlessness ot cow bows home. He is roasted in summer and frozen in winter. The lands can never be used for anything but grazing and the dis tances are therefore something immense. One peculiarity of the country makes rapid riding very difficult, not to say dangerous, undertaking The earth IS so friable that 8 ] tiny watercourse will speedily cut for itself a l deep gully, or ''coolie" as it is called, the I IL Id, II, f1 an | tirely problem matical. A horseman who rides | with a cowboys reeklessress may suddenly 1 find himself at the bottom of six or eight | foot coolie, with his horse on top of him and 1 no way of getting out-if he happens to be 1 still alive-saye tunneling up to the head ot | the stream through the snow. Then one of
 your broncho's feet is as likely as not to sink
 suddenly two feet down into coyotes hole | when hs is going at furious pace. Result | His leg snaps off like a pipe stem and you | are shot through the air to point far oe yond, and picked up more dead than alive 1 The water is generally bitter with aiKan ano
 scorches your throat as you swallow It; there
 is little to eat and that is hard 10 get
 An Astronomers Views on the Piano l Richard A. Pr ctor in St. Louis Globe Democrat
 ssNo musician 9 said Ketten to me, lex poets to be touched by good pianoforte play
 ing, the object of which is not to move the
 emotions, but to satisfy the taste
 picture to myself Mozart or Beethoven
 at one of those ridiculous little boxes on leg
 called in their day pianos, whence not one
 tenth the volume of sound could ever hav'
 come which modern Steinway or Erart
 pours forth moving all hearers himself in cluded--to sadness or to joy, stirring ever, emotion in turn at his will, and l wonde what either of those masters would hay said of the profane moderns who speak o Z i the piano as made but to satisfy the taste b the exhibition of powerful and delicate ms
 nipulative processes, think Shakespeare wa
 moved by the soft sounds of the still weaSe t music boxes of his day when he wrote 9Th @ man that hath not music in his soul" an
 | the rest that we know so well. He writes
 | his love of the time
 l. l When thou thy music play yst
 JIpon that blessed wood whose motion sounds With thy sweet fingers when thou gently sway a The wiry concord that mine ears confounds,
 the whole tone of the sonnet telling of emt tions stirred by one whose execution VI l. doubtless as weak, compared with that " the modern performer, as was her poor mi n sic chest compared with a modern gran'